The Top 7... Mario spin-offs

Painter, doctor, savior - Mario excels at them all

There have been many comparisons between the Wii Remote and a PC mouse. Would you believe Nintendo's already tried its hand at the latter? The forgotten SNES peripheral camebundled with Mario Paint, one of the most innovative titles available at the time.

Eager artists the world over sat down in front of their TVs, mouse and ugly plastic mouse pad in hand, ready to draw, color and animate their own creations. For a cheapo mouse, it worked fairly well, and plenty ofbizarre works spawned from hours of dutiful toiling. Truly savvy kids learned how to hook up their SNES systems to a VCR and record entire stories told through a series of static images.

The best part (other than using the red spray can to make everything from Yoshi to Goombas bleed profusely), however, was the music generator. If you knew anything about music at all, you could create startlingly impressive tracks. Anything from "Take on Me" to Coldplay is possible.